First Balfour, Inc., the engineering and construction arm of the Lopez Group, has recently signed up for Google Apps for Business with local cloud pioneer IPC (IP Converge Data Services, Inc.).
The company is one of the first construction firms in the Philippines to move to Google Apps. IPC President Reynaldo R. Huergas said, “Being one of the most trusted construction companies in the Philippines that invest heavily on their employees, First Balfour is a great addition to our roster of clientele. We see our partnership as one that will help pave the way for more engineering and construction companies in the country to be encouraged to use Google Apps as tools to bring their operations to the next level.”
Photo from First Balfour website
As First Balfour projects are now spread across the entire Philippines and having its employee population double its size a year ago, employee connectivity and engagement proved to be a challenge. “We wanted our employees to continue feeling part of the First Balfour family and strengthen the sense of community even if they are assigned far from Manila. Doing so meant providing our people with the most accessible workplace tools for communication and collaboration, and Google Apps proved to be exactly the tool we were looking for,” shared First Balfour Vice President for Human Resources Caloy Salonga.
Of the many cloud services available to Philippine enterprises today, email remains to be one of the main entry points to cloud computing. Apart from it being a vital communication tool within the organization, it is usually the course for companies that wish to experience the benefits of cloud computing before further entrusting their other business operations to the cloud.
“Prior to Google Apps, we had issues with our email system characterized by delayed mails, limited email attachments, among others. With this recent move, we can now focus on improving our other ICT systems as we no longer have to monitor email storage spaces because of Google Apps’ sufficient cloud storage capacity,” said First Balfour ICT Senior Manager Neil Sia.
Collaboration within the company has just become easier and more accessible because each employee can now access Google Apps features like Gmail, Google Drive and Google Calendar using any device, anytime and anywhere.
“Google Apps will definitely save our company time and money in so many ways from travel to document sharing, arranging meetings, and creation of presentations. Even our clients will directly benefit from Google Apps as these enable faster and easier sharing and updating of documents,” shared First Balfour Chief Executive Officer Dr. Fiorello R. Estuar.
“We want to help enterprises make their transition into the Cloud as effortless as possible. We ensure that we provide our clients world-class services and equip them with the knowledge to enjoy the Cloud’s full potential. Whether it’s their email and collaboration tools to more complex cloud services such as DDoS mitigation or CRM solutions, we’ve made ourselves a one-stop shop for enterprises. There is no denying that the Cloud is the future; any entrepreneur who wants to see their business succeed should take full advantage of it,” said Huergas.
